Appliance and light timers are known in the art. Such timers have a multitude of uses, for example, for switching lights on and off while on vacation, and for turning on and off various appliances at certain times of the day or night.
Known timers include a rotary type which has an analog clock-like dial and a receptacle or outlet for a load such as a lamp. Switches which are positioned on or adjacent to the dial are positionable to select times at which power is supplied to or removed from the load. Typically, the rotary type timer is plugged into a standard electrical receptacle.
There are several drawbacks to the rotary type timer. One major drawback is that the timer can inadvertently be disconnected or unplugged from the electrical receptacle rendering the timer inoperable. Another drawback to this type of timer is that generally the switches permit the times to be only approximately or roughly set. That is, the timer and the on-off switches are set to turn the appliance on and of at approximate times rather than providing an exact control of power to the load. Hence, close control of the time that power is supplied to or removed from the lights and/or appliances is at best difficult.
Another known class of timers is mountable to a standard electrical wall-switch box. This class of timer includes, in one form, a receptacle module mounted to a mounting plate which is mounted to the electrical connector box. A standard wall switch cover plate is mounted to the mounting plate.
The receptacle module is "hard-wired" to an electrical system. An electronic plug-in module, effectively a timer, is configured to plug into the receptacle module and mount over the wall switch cover plate.
Other wall switch timer products incorporate a fixed surround and are not used with existing switch face plates. These timers are usually intended for use in single switch boxes.
Thus, there continues to be a need for a modular timer which is configured to be easily installed in a standard wall mounted electrical box, and which is flexibly configured for adaptable use with single and multiple-ganged electrical boxes.